


A Fairy Tale... Of Sorts

by serendipitousDescent



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Medieval, Crack, Crossdressing, Gen, Human Names, Out of Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-02
Updated: 2014-05-02
Packaged: 2018-01-21 01:44:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,895
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1533107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/serendipitousDescent/pseuds/serendipitousDescent
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Apparently being a princess doesn't mean much when nobody knows that you exist outside of a very small group of people. And that's why Matthew knows only his brother would even think of coming to rescue him from the dragon... and even then it would probably be more for the chance to kill the dragon. </p><p>Well. </p><p>There is that one knight who noticed him get carried off. </p><p>But he thinks that that would make things worse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Fairy Tale... Of Sorts

**Author's Note:**

  * For [rainamonster97](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rainamonster97/gifts).



> ...I'm just going to warn you that everyone is majorly out of character. And that this was in no way intended to be a serious story.
> 
> (I love it.)

Once upon a time, a beautiful, young princess lived in the tallest tower of the biggest castle. She-

No.

No. No. No.

Matthew Williams was in no way a girl, though he couldn’t really deny that he was a princess. He’d been trying for years and yet he was still announced as the “Northern Princess” whenever he was forced to go to court. As for living in the tallest tower, well, yes, his bedroom was in one of the obnoxiously tall towers in the castle he called a home but it certainly wasn’t the tallest. He’d die everyday from the amount of stairs he’d have to go up.

Oh right, and he wore dresses.

Nobody seemed to be bothered by that fact though. Even as he was currently sitting in the throne room, listening to the pleas of the peasants, they didn’t even bother looking twice at the beautiful, intricate gown he wore. He was almost upset that they weren’t looking at him; the dress he was wearing was majestic. The material was a rich purple silk with a lighter layer of chiffon over top of that. It was a new dress that had just been made for him the week before and he loved it. 

Dear god, did he love this dress.

It was just so frilly. And soft.

He’d grown up wearing them. His brother often cursed his Papa because of the amount of time he’d spend just looking at the exotic fabrics in the town. The King had been the one who first forced him to wear a dress, after all. He didn’t have to be forced after that, though.

And nobody ever had to explain to him why women wore dresses instead of trousers. It was obviously because most men couldn’t pull off a dress like a woman could.

“Your Grace, Your Grace!”

The young man who ran into the throne room was hysterical. His clothes were ripped in numerous places and his face was so pale that it was obvious he would soon fall faint. 

A real damsel in distress.

“What’s the matter?” the King asked the young man.

Matthew sighed and kindly kept his opinions to himself; chances were that he would be ignored even if he said anything. Things like this happened at least once a week. Half the time the person running into the throne room would end up in his papa’s bed by the end of the night. It would be interesting to see who had been stabbed out in the marketplace this time.

“There’s a dragon out on the countryside, ravaging the farms! Oh, you must do something, Your Grace!” the young man exclaimed.

Matthew perked up at that. A dragon! He didn’t think that he’d ever seen a dragon before, though he’d heard the legends. Supposedly they’d retreated almost a century before because they’d been hunted so viciously. Even after hearing the story of the torture that the dragons had had to go through, his brother, Alfred, was still intent on one day hunting one.

Thank god that Alfred had decided to take an extended trip to the Isles the week before. 

“Oh, I will. So long as I get to ravage your gorgeous, muscled body in my bed tonight, that is.”

“Papa!” Matthew hissed, feeling mostly exasperated at the King’s antics.

Things went on as if he hadn’t said anything at all as the young man blushed. “You would honour me with such a thing? I would gladly accept, Your Grace! I just wish to send word to wife so that she’s not worried when I don’t come home tonight.”

“She’s welcome to join us if she so wishes,” the King offered. 

“I apologize on her behalf but she doesn’t appreciate the act very much at all. It would be much more enjoyable if it were just the two of us, Your Grace.”

“Fair enough.”

Matthew shook his head, “The dragon, Papa?”

The King blinked, “Oh yes, and do send ten of our finest knights to go fend off the dragon.”

The young man proved to be too much of temptation as the two made bedroom eyes at each other from across the throne room. Matthew could already picture the gossip that had to be spreading around the room right now. Except when he looked around the room, he saw a mixture of approving and jealous expressions. 

He should have never expected anything else. 

“Papa, I wish to go see the dragon,” Matthew commented, turning towards his father.

Silence greeted him and his eyebrow twitched as the King continued making bedroom eyes with the frail young man. For some odd reason, he wouldn’t have been the least bit surprised if the two of them started fucking right in the middle of the throne room. Nobody else would think twice about it.

“‘Oh yes, Matthew, of course you can go see the dragon!’

“Really, Papa? You would let me do such a thing?

“‘As if I would deny the loveliest of my sons anything at all,’” he mocked his father’s voice, acting out the exchange with his hands.

Someone let out a small laugh but when Matthew lifted his head, nobody was paying any attention to him. A coincidence then. Regardless, he stood from his seat and headed straight for the door as if he’d just actually received permission to leave. He might as well have, given the amount of people protesting his decision to go see what this dragon was all about.

The knights were outside already when he exited the palace, just about to leave. It was hard to pretend that the poorly-designed armour didn’t bother him but nobody had wanted to listen to his suggestions when it had come up at one of the many meetings he was forced to go to. 

“Excuse me,” he said, “But would you guys mind if I tagged along with you while you go fight the dragon? I want to see what it looks like before you kill it and all.”

One of the soldiers glanced over at him, fearfully. “Kill the dragon? I thought that we were just going to… I don’t know, drive it off or something.”

Matthew’s face turned a bright shade of red and he quickly looked down at the floor. “Right, well…”

“Are you talking to someone there, Felix?” the captain suddenly asked.

Felix looked back and forth between Matthew and the captain, a confused look on his face. But the captain’s opinion of him was obviously getting worse by the second. Matthew almost laughed at the expression on his face. It was almost as if the poor soldier didn’t have the slightest clue as to who offend in a situation like this.

“Well, Felix? Have you finally gone mad?” the captain repeated.

“No, sir. I was… I was just mumbling to myself, sir! It won’t happen again.”

“Make certain that it doesn’t.”

The soldiers left the palace walls then, heading into the town. Felix was glancing back behind him every few seconds or so, staring right at Matthew who was giggling loudly.

* * *

By the time that Matthew got out to the countryside, the knights had already started their courageous fight against the fearsome dragon. Or at least he was fairly certain that it was supposed to be fearsome and courageous. 

The large dragon had flown up into the sky, seemingly content to stay where it was. The knights, on the other hand, were screaming at it from the ground as the archers attempted to shoot it down with arrows. Which would have been working had their aim been better or if the dragon didn’t just shrug them off the few times it was hit. He wasn’t entirely certain what they were trying to achieve by all this.

If anything, the dragon seemed to be teasing the soldiers.

Matthew kept on walking, so that he was closer to the fight. The dragon may have been beautiful from where he’d been standing but he was certain that it would be even more so if he could get closer. Chances were that he wouldn’t get hurt in the midst of all this anyways. At least, not if the soldiers had any sort of intelligence at all.

It was a shame though that the hem of his dress were getting muddy though. It would have to go in the trash when he got back to the castle which would be a real disappointment. It was all in the name of beauty though.

The dragon suddenly swooped down towards him as he stood in the middle of the field. He was knocked down to his feet, the dragon missing him by a foot or two. 

Matthew groaned loudly as he pictured how much mud had to be on his dress now. 

A tall figure suddenly stood in front of him and he could see the dark brown threads that made up their long, long hair. They held a sword in one hand and a shield in the other, ready to protect him at a moment’s notice. From what, Matthew wasn’t entirely certain. The dragon seemed much more interested in playing around with them than actually eating them.

“Don’t worry, Princess, I’ll protect you from this monstrous beast!” they exclaimed, their voice oddly feminine. 

“Why bother?” Matthew asked, looking up at the majestic looking beast, “I’m sure that it would just leave me alone if you went and joined the others.”

“You don’t understand how these creatures work, si - ma’am. They’re liable to eat anything that’s in its path!”

“If that were the case, then they’d just go after those cattle over there. Seems like a lot less hassle that way.”

Matthew was promptly ignored in favour of the knight uselessly putting up its shield in order to defend against the dragon as it swooped down towards them again. It really did seem like the dragon was playing with them, pulling up only about five feet above their heads. 

The knight started to hit its shield with its sword, probably in hopes that it would drive the dragon closer in order for them to slay it. Except with both arms held up high, Matthew could clearly see that the knight trying to protect him was, in fact, a woman. The dragon’s movements were no longer the playful ones that they had been before, now agitated by the harsh sounds.

“Stay back, foul beast!” the knight shouted.

“Who the fuck even are you?” Matthew asked her, standing up and brushing himself off as best as he could manage.

She turned back, her long brown hair falling over her shoulder. “Just a knight under your service, Princess.”

It was in that moment that the dragon swooped down from the sky. Matthew screamed as he suddenly felt large claws wrap around his body, tearing his dress to shreds. Flailing around in the sky was not what he’d had planned for the day but it turned out that that was exactly what he’d ended up doing. 

“Don’t worry, Princess, I’ll save you!” the female knight yelled from the ground.

“Pardon my language, but don’t fucking bother! You’ll only get me killed!” 

“Don’t be scared, I’ll come as soon as I can!”

Matthew groaned to himself, dreading the moment what the girl knight would try and find him. If he had any luck at all, she’d end up dead in the bottom of a lake somewhere.

* * *

Flying was surprisingly boring. Matthew wasn’t entirely certain how long he’d been up in the air for, only that every time he looked down at the ground for too long, he felt nauseous. His body ached, his dress was ripped to shreds, and it was probably only a matter of time before he became this majestic beast’s lunch. Not to mention the underlying fear that he’d be dropped the couple hundred feet to the ground.

All in all, this day was really starting to suck. 

His stomach lurched as the dragon dove down into the mountain range below them. He was expecting it to let up suddenly, just as it had done a few times before, but instead it just kept going and he screamed as they got closer and closer mountainside. Matthew squeezed his eye shut moments before they crashed into the mountain, tensing his body for the inevitable crash.

Except it never came. And when he opened his eyes again, they were deep inside of the mountain. In a cave that was considered spacious even to the dragon itself. 

The dragon’s wings flapped loudly as they came to a standstill and Matthew shrieked as he was dropped to the ground. The entire five feet. Oh god, it was the ground though. He stared at the smooth, cold rock for a few moments before kissing it, nearly sobbing. Never again would he take the feeling of having both of his feet on the ground for granted, not until long after he’d died. And who knew? It might even continue on after that because fuck if he knew what happened after someone died.

"You like it, yes? As do I." 

Matthew screamed.

A very tall, very naked man was standing just a few feet away from him, a wide smile on his face. Matthew scrambled backwards, trying not to cringe at the feeling of his dress catching on the rocks. Maybe the ground wasn't as awesome as he'd thought. And the dragon was gone. Seemingly disintegrated into a pile of rocks or something if the otherwise empty cave was anything to go by.

The man kept quiet, staring at him intently. It was almost as if this man was trying to study him or something, infinitely interested in what he was doing. He almost seemed to be something not from this world. And it looked as if he was on the verge of laughing, which Matthew found incredibly demeaning.

“What are you doing here?” Matthew eventually hissed at the man, “Don’t you realize that this is a dragon’s cave? You’re going to get killed! That is if I don’t die first!”

The naked man blinked. “Killed? Why would I be killed?”

“Because the dragon’s going to eat you, you fuckhead!”

“Really? Farmer’s sheep are much more delicious than this form would be but maybe not everyone thinks the same as I. I find it’s something in the way the farmers squirm afterwards,” the man informed him with a smile.

The blood drained from Matthew’s face as he suddenly put two and two together. Never before had he felt like such an idiot. How would the man have gotten into the cave, naked and without any supplies that would have helped him get there in the first place? Not to mention that the dragon had completely disappeared in the five or so minutes it had been since he’d gotten here. 

It was confirmed. 

Matthew Williams was a grade A idiot. 

There had never been anyone as stupid as he was.

“Is there something the matter?” the man - no, the dragon asked him.

Matthew wasn’t entirely certain whether he wanted to go curl up into a small ball and cry for the rest of his life or if throwing himself off the nearest cliff was a much more viable option. Throwing himself off of the cliff might end his suffering too soon though. Crying in a corner it was then.

The dragon took another step closer to him and he inched back again. There was no way that he was going to let that beast get any closer to him than absolutely necessary. He didn’t want to know what some sort of white, shape-shifting creature with a habit of not wearing any clothes was going to do to him. Not to mention that nose. He’d never even thought that someone could have a nose quite that big before now.

Then again, he’d never thought that he’d ever end up seeing a dragon up until a few hours ago and now look where he was. In the middle of a dragon’s cave. While said dragon was waiting patiently for an answer from him.

“Nothing,” he muttered and cursed his voice for being so soft, “Just the usual stuff. Being stuck in a cave with a dragon who would probably want nothing more than to eat me for lunch. Nothing too out of the ordinary with that or anything.”

“Why would I have bothered carrying you all the way here if I wanted to eat you?” the dragon questioned, tilting his head.

Matthew shrugged. “I don’t know what goes on in your mind! Maybe you wanted to save me until later or use me as some sort of ransom to get more pigs and cows than you’d ever need.”

“That had never occurred to me. Perhaps I shall use you as ransom then. Ah, but that would take away the thrill of seeing those humans get all hot and bothered just because I ate a cow or two. Or twenty. It’s not as if they don’t have more than enough cows already.”

He laughed and slowly got up to his feet, trying his best to wipe the dirt off his torn dress. A lost cause but still not one that he was about to give up on anytime soon now. Maybe this wasn’t quite as bad as he thought that it was. Maybe this dragon was actually an alright person outside of the whole being a dragon thing. At the very least, it seemed as if the dragon wasn’t about to try and eat him. Not yet anyways. He’d tried betting on what the future held for him once and he wasn’t about to go try that again. It never ended well.

“I’m Matthew Williams, by the way. If you’re at all interested in who you kidnapped from the countryside to take away to your evil lair,” he introduced himself with a smile. 

“My evil lair? Ha, I like you, Matvey,” the dragon grinned childishly, “I am Ivan but feel free to call me Vanya. All my friends do… or at least they did while they were still among the living.”

He took back that comment about the dragon being an alright person.

* * *

“I told you that I can’t eat raw meat!”

“I do not understand why not, Matvey. The natural flavours fade away after you have it cooked. I have tried it in the past after watching you silly humans do it.”

“Yes and we do it because our stomachs can’t handle raw meat. I’m rather fond of not dying, thank you very much.”

“You humans are so strange.”

“And I could say the same of you as well, Ivan.”

Ivan chuckled as he seemed to do so often and just like that, there was a nice little campfire on the ground there. The perfect size to cook meat on and everything. And then the dragon/man/beast/whatever he was calling himself that day stared at Matthew expectantly. Nothing new there.

Matthew sighed and climbed down from the large rock he’d claimed as the comfiest in the entire cave. After an unfortunate accident with a strange sword he’d found near the back of the cave and a very ferocious looking dandelion, he’d had to cut most of the skirts of his dress off. He was still trying to adjust to feeling of his legs being bared to the world. Much in the same way that he was trying to adjust to having to cook his own meals. 

Ivan never spent longer than thirty seconds trying to cook anything and then it either turned out burnt to a crisp or hardly cooked at all. There were no inbetweens with Ivan.

One of the slabs of pork was shoved onto the long piece of metal Matthew had commandeered for cooking and he held it over the fire. It was with a regretful sigh that he realized that this was getting easier than it had been a couple weeks ago. He could also see a bit of muscle on his arms.

It was downright depressing.

“MATTIE!”

Matthew dropped the rod of metal in his shock, hissing as the meat landed in a pile of ashes on the floor. Well, that was one meal that he’d never get to eat. Especially if the owner of that particularly obnoxious voice was who he thought it was. 

“MATT… ARE YOU THERE, MATT? IT’S ME, ALFRED.”

As if it would have been anyone else.

“Who is this Alfred?” Ivan asked, tilting his head to the side.

“My brother,” Matthew replied with a groan, “I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s still at the bottom of the mountain too. How the fuck did he find me here?”

“You have a brother, Matvey?”

“You didn’t tell me that you had a sister until she showed up out of the blue yesterday!”

A shiver ran through Ivan’s body. “There is a difference. I did not wish to… frighten you with stories of the things that my sister does. There is no way to explain how she can terrify a person if she wishes them to be so.”

“And you don’t think that it’s the same with my brother?”

They stared at each other for a few moments, contemplating just what that implied about the two of them. Not anything good. At least they could both agree that their sibling wasn’t going to be a topic up for discussion anytime soon. Or it wouldn’t be if Alfred wasn’t still outside somewhere, screaming at the heavens as if he expected someone to answer.

“MATTHEW, WHERE ARE YOU?”

Ivan sighed, looking at the very dead cow regretfully, “I will go and attempt to drive him off then. If he’s anything like Natalia…”

“He’s not quite the same brand of crazy as she is. A few touches more egocentric though. I should probably come with you though, he might just freak out if he sees you out there, naked,” Matthew agreed, slowly.

“Ah, I was not planning on heading out there like this.”

“You weren’t…?”

“No, I had thought that it would be best if I go out to deal with him in my other form.”

Matthew stared at Ivan for a few moments. He thought of Ivan, standing there naked in front of Alfred and wearing nothing at all. Then he thought of Ivan in his dragon form, tormenting Alfred from the sky. Ivan smiled at him with that innocent childishness.

“Yeah, that’ll probably be for the best,” he agreed with a sigh.

It no longer came as much of a surprise when Ivan quickly morphed from his human form into that of a large, white dragon. Really, the shock factor disappeared when one spends half of their time watching Ivan switch between forms simply because he found something interesting or was bored. It didn’t come as much of surprise when Matthew found out that this place was dreadfully boring either. It wasn’t hard to miss when Ivan reminded him every few hours or so.

Ivan put his huge head on the ground, staring at Matthew expectantly. 

A scowl spread across his face.

Neither of them moved for a few moments, both too stubborn to give in. Eventually Matthew walked towards the giant lump of scales and muscle on the ground and scrambled to climb up onto its back. He shrieked as Ivan suddenly shifted and held onto one of the spikes for dear life.

Trusting a dragon to make sure that you don’t die? He wasn’t quite that stupid. At least not yet.

Ivan was oblivious to Matthew’s discomfort as he suddenly took off into the air, heading for the narrow-looking crack in the cave ceiling. His wings flattened out as he prepared himself for exiting, slowly getting faster. And then they were in the sky, the clear blue surrounding them for miles. 

The only thing that could have been clearer was why Ivan always chose that particular hole to exit the cave from. Or go into the cave for that matter. Matthew sometimes wondered if he realized that there were other, easier ways to get inside.

Probably not.

“MATTIE, TELL ME WHERE YOU ARE!”

Matthew cringed both at the sound of that obnoxious voice and the way that Ivan dove down towards it, making him cling even tighter. It was easy to see the shock of blond hair near the bottom of the mountain, even from where they were. His last hope that it wasn’t Alfred disappeared at the sight of it. Only his brother would hike across the entire country in order to find him after he’d been whisked away by a dragon.

He couldn’t tell if he was annoyed or secretly touched.

“STAY WHERE YOU ARE, FOUL BEAST, AND TELL ME WHAT YOU’VE DONE WITH MY DEAREST LITTLE BRO!”

Annoyed. That was definitely annoyance. 

They were close enough to Alfred now that Matthew was able to see him properly. And it looked almost as if Alfred had decided that taking baths in the mud and maybe a couple swamps for good measure would increase his chances of finding him. Maybe some nasty old lady had told him that on his journey here. Alfred was just gullible and naive enough that he’d believe it.

“I’m right here, Alfred!” Matthew yelled at him, forcing his arm off of the spike to wave at him, “Please don’t insult Ivan like that! I’m fine!”

Alfred looked around, confused, “FINE THEN. IF YOU WON’T TELL ME THEN I’LL SLAY YOU, YOU DELECTABLE CREATURE, AND THEN FIND MATTIE MYSELF!”

“Detestable, Alfred, not delectable,” Matthew muttered.

But Alfred was already drawing his sword, looking determined as he stared up at Ivan with his jaw set. Matthew felt like an idiot for thinking that this would have ended in any way other than a fight. Perhaps it would have turned out differently if it had been someone else but Alfred could never be anyone other than Alfred. Trust Matthew, he’d tried to make Alfred someone else on several different occasions. 

If only that book of majyyks had actually worked. 

Well, except for the invisibility spell. That one had worked a little too well. 

“Could you get a little bit closer to the ground? I don’t think that he can hear me from up here,” Matthew asked.

Ivan seemed to hesitate for a few moments before moving closer to the ground, hovering just a few feet above the dirt floor. Unfortunately, Alfred took that as the best time to rush forward, screaming as he slashed his sword across Ivan’s front leg. The following crack was heard by all of them.

It broke.

The sword had broke into two; the blade lying on the ground a good ten feet away while Alfred stood there with only the hilt in his hands. Alfred was staring at it, looking as if someone had just crushed all of his hopes and dreams in a single, fowl swoop. Matthew swore that he could see tears in his brother’s eyes.

“Alfred, it’s just a damn sword!” Matthew yelled at him, “And I’m perfectly fine anyways, so there’s no need to go attacking him in the first place!”

Alfred suddenly looked up, seeing Matthew properly all of a sudden, “Ma - Mattie? Is that you?”

Yes, his brother was crying. Matthew could hear his voice cracking and knew that it would only be a matter of time before he regressed into a full-blown temper tantrum. They happened more often than Matthew cared to admit. Mostly because he was the only one who ended up dealing with it. 

Ivan landed on the ground at last, apparently deeming it safe. Matthew stared at the ground in distaste before he slid down Ivan’s side with his eyes squeezed shut. He could feel his dread as he walked over to his brother, knowing exactly what his reaction would be.

“It’s you!” Alfred exclaimed, right on time.

Matthew only had a few moments to tense his body before strong arms wrapped around his shoulders and he was lifted up into the air and spun around in circles. His teeth grit at the action. It felt like his body was going to break in two simply from the amount of strength that was behind each and every one of Alfred’s actions. If only he could still sneak into his brother’s room in the middle of the night to dye his hair bright pink. Those had been the best times.

“I’m so glad that you’re alright, Matt!” Alfred announced, finally coming to a stop. 

Then his brother stopped, his face going pale. Alfred’s eyes rolled back into his head and then he dropped to the ground in a faint.

Matthew looked behind him to see what Alfred had been looking at: a very naked, very human Ivan. His eyes suddenly brightened as he thought of something. Ivan only seemed to smile at him cheerfully, entirely oblivious to what was going on in Matthew’s mind at the moment. And there was a lot going on in Matthew’s mind right now.

“Come on, we’re going to the palace!” Matthew claimed, a grin spreading across his face.

“You wish to go back there? Why?” Ivan asked.

“Because there’s no way that Papa can ignore me if I bring you with me! It doesn’t matter what form you take, he’ll have to realize that I actually exist once I show up there with you.”


End file.
